


nosebleed

by fairbanks



Series: goretober 2018 [15]
Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canonical Character Death, Gen, Goretober 2018, Nosebleed, Season 3 Spoilers, s3 finale spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-21
Updated: 2018-10-21
Packaged: 2019-08-05 04:51:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,602
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16361153
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fairbanks/pseuds/fairbanks
Summary: Jon manages to get Tim freed from the Archives.





	nosebleed

  1. **nosebleed**



  
  


“I hate to throw around cliches, Jon, but in this case I would advise you be careful what you wish for,” says Elias, primly punctuated by the cap of his no doubt far too expensive pen closing.

 

Jon hates it, of course, the pen and the vague, cliche warning, the fact he’s supposed to feel victorious right now but he just feels hollow. Tim was free, he was no longer a member of the Archives or the Institute, and Elias swore that wouldn’t mean killing him later. It cost Jon a great deal he didn’t care to think about now but it was done, he did the right thing and

 

and he didn’t feel any better, any lighter for it. He didn’t expect to but maybe he was still naive enough to hope.

 

“If you hate it so much then do us both a favor and don’t bother saying anymore,” Jon snaps, lacking his usual bite. Elias is amused in that invisible way of his, stands and offers Jon a hand.

 

“Shall we?”

 

-

 

“ _ Really? _ ” Melanie snaps, and Jon imagines he can hear her teeth grinding from the safe distance he has between them. In that safe distance is Tim’s desk, empty. He didn’t bother saying goodbye to Jon, and frankly Jon is grateful. 

 

Melanie is not grateful, which he expected. He couldn’t say her ire was unfair. “So that’s it? He gets to leave and the rest of us are stuck?”

 

“I could only manage him, and he-”

 

“He threw the biggest, loudest tantrum,” Melanie interrupts, hand slapped on the barren desk. Martin looks nervously between them, resigned in some small way. Basira is as composed as ever, watching Melanie like she’s waiting for the inevitable moment she’ll need to step in. “God forbid any of us forget how bad  _ Tim _ had it, for even one moment, when we’re all just as screwed as he was. Well you know what? Fuck Tim and his self-centered nonsense and fuck  _ you _ for deciding he deserved this most. Better to deal with asking forgiveness than permission, right?”

 

Jon stays silent, finds himself far too tired to argue with her. She wasn’t wrong, not really, and he doesn’t know how to say it all happened so fast, the chance so quick he just… took it. How could he not pick Tim? There was no other option, not when Tim marched closer and closer to the grave with every passing day in these halls.

 

(But, of course, there were other options, there were always other options. His guilt made the choice for him, selfishly hoping for absolution in some form. Fitting he found none.)

 

“Melanie,” Basira says, calm and steady, and though Melanie whips her head to pin her with an angry glare she doesn’t go for Basira’s throat. Instead she just turns, leaves, storming up the steps to the lobby. Sometimes Jon wondered if Melanie wore anger like a shield against fear, because she had so much of it. It dripped off her everything, leaks in an old pipe, corrosion beyond repair.

 

With Melanie gone it was quiet, ringingly so, until Basira broke the silence with a sigh. “You probably made the right choice. Stoker was a ticking time bomb.”

 

“We don’t resent you,” Martin tries, glances to Basira quickly, flushes red. “I mean, I don’t at least.”

 

“No, neither do I,” Basira agrees. “It’s promising, means there’s a way to leave. Any idea what it entailed?”

 

Jon exhales through his nose, remembers the pressure in his temples and fine snap in the air as Elias did… something. “No, not really. Elias did something, at least it felt that way. He made it very clear it wasn’t something he’d do again, if he even could.”

 

“What did he want? I mean… why did he do it?” Martin stares and him and Jon finds it far too easy to lie.

 

“Cooperation, on my part. Further cooperation at least.” At least it wasn’t entirely untruthful, but to explain Elias’ ‘lessons’ in furthering his connection with the Eye was not something Jon ever planned on. “I made no such promise for the rest of you, so-”

 

“So we don’t have to… cooperate,” Basira finishes for him, reads between the lines. Jon couldn’t help them as knowingly as he did before, but he made no promise that would involve stopping them and any future planning. “Alright, we can work with this. No offense to Stoker but he wasn’t exactly helpful anyway.”

 

“Basira,” Martin tries, though he doesn’t argue the point. His attention, as always, is fixed on Jon. The edges of him seem fainter, as if he felt the weight of Sasha and Tim’s absence. “Are you going to be alright? I mean with everything, and Melanie was-”

 

“She wasn’t wrong,” Jon answers firmly, shakes his head. “It’s- I’m fine, thank you, Martin. Did you- did Tim say anything when he left?”

 

Martin glances away, shifting on his feet, one to another. “No,” he answers. It feels like a lie, but Jon nods all the same.

 

-

 

His dreams flow as they always do- trains and graveyards and rainslick streets with his back ever to the sky. He trudges passed a door he refuses to enter and finds instead an arch way, a tunnel. He doesn’t want to go in. He doesn’t want to go in, lord he doesn’t want to go in. But he has to know.

 

Through the archway is a stage, rows of seats filled. The forms in the seats squirm, sacks of skin filled with worms eating and eating. Crude faces in costume makeup are drawn where real faces should be. They all look at the stage and he doesn’t want to look at it. But he does.

 

Tim is there, in the spotlight. His eyes are wide, sharp and empty. Do they see him? He cannot speak, cannot help, only watch as a clown moves Tim’s limbs, draps something thick over Tim’s arm. Flesh, he Knows, from Danny. The clown wraps it around Tim, turns and turns and turns him. It pushes Tim into a grand bow, directly at him, at the audience. There’s applause though none of the worm filled skin sacks can lift a hand.

 

He wakes, heart hammering, and swallows down bile.

 

-

 

Tim’s standing in the hallway to his flat when Jon gets off work. It’s been a couple of weeks since Tim’s departure and he looks just as terrible as he did before, bags thick under his eyes and skin sallow. He glances over from where he’s slumped on the wall, stands straight, strolls over.

 

“Boss,” he greets.

 

“Not anymore,” answers Jon, and notices Tim’s fist is clenched so tightly his knuckles are white. A useful thing to realize if he had the reflexes to dodge the punch that follows.

 

There’s a bright crack of pain as Tim’s fist connects with his face, a surprising amount of force given his condition but perhaps his emotional state made up for any weakness of the body. Jon thinks as much in a distant way, realizes he’s slammed back against the wall and Tim hits him again, knocking Jon’s head to the side, then again, then raises his fist swollen and slick with blood and

 

and Jon closes his eyes, feels blood dripping in hot, steady rivulets down his nose and over his lips. He parts them to breath, gets blood on his tongue like every gulp of air is rust coating his tongue, iron tinge. 

 

“Damn you,” Tim says, doesn’t snap, just says like the feelings he needed to pour into such words were all deadened nerves. “No matter where I go you’re there. You’re there, and you’re watching, and it never, ever stops. No matter how far I go, no matter what I put in me to make me sleep- you and  _ it _ , both of you, you’re always, always  _ there. _ ”

 

Jon opens his eyes, finds his glasses must have fallen in the scuffle. Careful what you wish for, he thinks. He’s far too tired to hate Elias now. “This-” he tries, has to spit thick, phlegmy blood to the side, hates the disgusting noise of it. “This is- is the best I could do. I don’t-”

 

“You  _ don’t _ ,” Tim tells him. His fist is still half raised, angry red. “I thought I was crazy, but Daisy has them too. Basira used to, until Elias snatched her up. So here we are- no matter what you’ll stalk me.”

 

“Unless you kill me,” Jon says, and the words don’t feel like they’re his. The way Tim’s eyes widen makes him wonder if they came right from Tim’s head, and Jon straightens as best he can, dabbing his bloadsoaked chin with his sleeve. This shirt was ruined now anyway. “You’re probably right. Maybe it wouldn’t make a difference but maybe it will. This isn’t really why you’re back, is it?”

 

Tim’s jaw tenses a moment, eases. “I’m coming. I want to- to  _ kill _ these bastards myself.”

 

Jon swallows blood and realize how pointless it all was, how trying to cut Tim loose never meant he wouldn’t continue unerring to his own destruction.

 

“No,” he spits, overcome with it. “I’m not losing you too. You’re not part of this anymore.”

 

“You don’t get to decide that,” Tim sneers, and he’s right.

 

-

 

At the end of the world as they knew it Tim holds up the detonator. “I don’t know if you can hear me Jon, but thanks for this. I don’t know if I forgive you, but- you tried. I know you tried.”

 

Jon can hear him, faintly. And then with a click a world ends.


End file.
